Blurry album art from NAS

[Fralle]

Hi,

I am having trouble with extremely bad quality album art playing from my NAS. NAS is actually a SSD connected directly to my Asus router and then I pretty much followed the instructions in the link below.

I never had this problem using my previous streamer and their native app, Lindemann Limetree. I also tried yesterday using Mcconect and you can se and compare the pictures yourself.

How to turn your ASUS router into a NAS - Digital Citizen

Buying a NAS (Network Attached Storage) solution can be expensive and overkill for most home users. A more affordable option is to get an external hard drive or SSD and connect it to your router using the USB port. You can then set up the router to share the drive with your network or the […]

www.digitalcitizen.life

Anyone else hade this problem and know how to fix it?

 

[Mr Ee]

Hi,

I am having trouble with extremely bad quality album art playing from my NAS. NAS is actually a SSD connected directly to my Asus router and then I pretty much followed the instructions in the link below.

I never had this problem using my previous streamer and their native app, Lindemann Limetree. I also tried yesterday using Mcconect and you can se and compare the pictures yourself.

How to turn your ASUS router into a NAS - Digital Citizen

Buying a NAS (Network Attached Storage) solution can be expensive and overkill for most home users. A more affordable option is to get an external hard drive or SSD and connect it to your router using the USB port. You can then set up the router to share the drive with your network or the […]

www.digitalcitizen.life

Anyone else hade this problem and know how to fix it?

I'm positive this has been mentioned before, quite some time ago.
Did you try a search?
(Not intended to be confrontational, just wondering if you found anything - I might even try searching myself.)

 

[Mr Ee]

I was possibly thinking of this thread, where wiim said it sas an app issue, but keep searching!

Blurry album artwork?

Just set up a WiiM mini for the first time. I am seeing very blurry album artwork in the player. I am using Qobuz. It seems to be so for every track. I am using an iPad mini, but it is also blurry on an iPhone. I’ve already tried restarting everything. Is this normal?

forum.wiimhome.com

 

[Fralle]

Hi,

Yes I did and it did not help. One thread was about Qobuz playback and in the other thread the author wrote a solution to the problem himeself:

"Well, seems as if miniDLNA server was the culprit. I installed Kodi, and the images are now in focus."

I dont find that helpful in my case, or maybe it is? Truth be told I dont really understand what he is writing. But I do know my NAS setup works in other apps, as you can se in the pictures.

 

[Mr Ee]

Hi,

Yes I did and it did not help. One thread was about Qobuz playback and in the other thread the author wrote a solution to the problem himeself:

"Well, seems as if miniDLNA server was the culprit. I installed Kodi, and the images are now in focus."

I dont find that helpful in my case, or maybe it is? Truth be told I dont really understand what he is writing. But I do know my NAS setup works in other apps, as you can se in the pictures.

I used to have a setup like yours - an hdd plugged into the router's usb.
It could just be my imagination, but I think I recall similar blurry artwork via the wiim app, on android.
However, I almost never used the wiim app, I used (and still use) bubbleupnp where I don't recall having this problem, in the same way mconnect works for you.
I now have a 'proper' nas with minimserver installed, and the album artwork in the wiim app is not blurry.
I suppose I could put an hdd back into the router to test...

 

[Fralle]

Thank you for your answer! If you could that would be really helpful! And I guess it could also be of help for the Wiim team when troubleshooting, if they do.

 

[MrSoul4470]

Do you have the album art tagged to your files or is it a separate file in the album folder? Are your music files FLAC or something else?

I use foobar2000 with Upnp-plugin. No problems at all.

 

[d6jg]

Almost certainly the router has a version of miniDLNA on it which has been chosen because it is very lightweight - a router doesn't have much spare processing power for additional tasks - and is sending a reduced sized image accordingly.

 

[harkpabst]

Almost certainly the router has a version of miniDLNA on it which has been chosen because it is very lightweight - a router doesn't have much spare processing power for additional tasks - and is sending a reduced sized image accordingly.

But wouldn't that imply blurry album around in mconnect as well?

The question is if the Asus router allows for some configuration of it's DLNA server. I remember I had to change something on my Synology NAS to make album art work unblurry on all clients, but can't even remember what I did from the top of my head.

 

[simbun]

I'm pretty sure the standard build of MiniDLNA (if that's the server in question) downscales to 160*160 by default.
Not sure how mconnect could show a higher res image though, assuming we are looking at the same server.

 

[d6jg]

But wouldn't that imply blurry album around in mconnect as well?

The question is if the Asus router allows for some configuration of it's DLNA server. I remember I had to change something on my Synology NAS to make album art work unblurry on all clients, but can't even remember what I did from the top of my head.

I think mconnect reads the embedded cover art directly whereas the miniDLNA sends a reduced version that it created at scan time but I may be wrong

 

[WiiM Team]

Hi,

I am having trouble with extremely bad quality album art playing from my NAS. NAS is actually a SSD connected directly to my Asus router and then I pretty much followed the instructions in the link below.

I never had this problem using my previous streamer and their native app, Lindemann Limetree. I also tried yesterday using Mcconect and you can se and compare the pictures yourself.

How to turn your ASUS router into a NAS - Digital Citizen

Buying a NAS (Network Attached Storage) solution can be expensive and overkill for most home users. A more affordable option is to get an external hard drive or SSD and connect it to your router using the USB port. You can then set up the router to share the drive with your network or the […]

www.digitalcitizen.life

Anyone else hade this problem and know how to fix it?

We will construct an identical environment using the ASUS router and a USB disk to investigate and address this issue.

 

[Fralle]

Do you have the album art tagged to your files or is it a separate file in the album folder? Are your music files FLAC or something else?

I use foobar2000 with Upnp-plugin. No problems at all.

.jpg inside every folder named "cover" and that same cover tagged to every son inside every folder using MP3 tag. Never had an issue with any other streamer or DAC.

 

[Fralle]

I'm pretty sure the standard build of MiniDLNA (if that's the server in question) downscales to 160*160 by default.
Not sure how mconnect could show a higher res image though, assuming we are looking at the same server.

It is the same server and it is not only Mconnect but also Lindemanns own app and before that Audirvana. The first time I had an issue ever in 4 years was now, when I plugged in the Wiim pro+.

 

[Fralle]

We will construct an identical environment using the ASUS router and a USB disk to investigate and address this issue.

Thank you! Maybe it is just some kind of setting I need to to inside the routers DLNA configuration or something?

 

[simbun]

I think mconnect reads the embedded cover art directly whereas the miniDLNA sends a reduced version that it created at scan time but I may be wrong

Good thinking! That's exactly what is happening (test by changing the cover.jpg).
mconnect is ignoring the AlbumArt URL supplied by MiniDLNA and instead pulling from the file.

If I use BubbleUPnP it shows the correct degraded album art, but mconnect does its own thing and displays the full resolution image. I'm not sure if it always does this or only if it's pulling from MiniDLNA.

So the WHA in this case is doing the right thing and shouldn't be changed...probably.

 

[PA3]

Hello. I know my problem is not exactly as per the above, but I am getting bitmapped / fuzzy images on my WiiM app when using it combined with Amazon Music Unlimited app. I use the Amazon app and cast to the WiiM Pro Plus and app to view the file quality. But an album image for example isn’t as clear or sharp / full res as the Amazon app’s view of it.

 

[Fralle]

We will construct an identical environment using the ASUS router and a USB disk to investigate and address this issue.

Will you get back to me in this thread or email or how does this work?

Also noticed that if I play an album through Mconnect and then open up the Wiim app the album art looks just fine.

 

[simbun]

Will you get back to me in this thread or email or how does this work?

Also noticed that if I play an album through Mconnect and then open up the Wiim app the album art looks just fine.

WiiM would need to start pulling artwork from the playing track in order to deliver higher resolution images as MiniDLNA only offers thumbnails.

EDIT: This will obviously only work for those files that have embedded images.

 

[Fralle]

WiiM would need to start pulling artwork from the playing track in order to deliver higher resolution images as MiniDLNA only offers thumbnails.

EDIT: This will obviously only work for those files that have embedded images.

How do you mean? Like I said all my albums have cover jpg. in each folder and then that exact jpg. is tagged (I guess that's what you mean by embedded right?) to each song using mp3tag.